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He has decided to increase his efforts. He’s been under the impression that he’s been doing his job, always the perfect hall monitor, but now four people are dead. He prefers not to think of them individually; it’s easier, so much easier, if they’re a statistic. And the statistics aren’t looking good. Someone needs to step in, since the others are obviously content with the sorry excuse for damage control they’re currently engaged in. If his classmates can’t control themselves, he’s just going to have to do it for them.
One by one he steals their keys. He does it subtly, of course; for the boys, he can get them while they’re in the bath or the pool or the gym, belongings sitting unsupervised in the changing rooms (often in distastefully messy piles, he notes). He checks their rooms quickly and has their cards back before they know they were ever gone. In most of the rooms he finds nothing. The girls are a bit trickier, but he is slow and methodical and nothing is impossible. There is a part of him that feels ashamed of sneaking into girls’ bedrooms – Asahina leaves her things on a towel by the pool; Syo doesn’t always lock Fukawa’s door; Celes is arrogant and careless about where she puts her card – but this is his duty, and he takes a quick look through their things before leaving the rooms in the same state he found them. In two days he has checked nearly every room except for those belonging to Kirigiri, Togami and Yamada.
Yamada makes his mistake when Celes comes knocking at his door. Ishimaru hides in the hallway, so he can’t quite make out what’s being said, but soon the two of them come running out. Yamada follows behind her like a loyal dog, and forgets to lock his door. As soon as they are out of sight, Ishimaru slips into the room and closes the door soundlessly behind him.
As is to be expected, the walls are adorned with posters of various anime women Ishimaru has never heard of. The bed is messy and there are a few items of clothing scattered across the floor, but other than that there is nothing odd about the room at a first glance. His first few minutes of inspection leave him empty handed, and he is about to give up and leave when he finds several stacks of papers in the bedside drawer.
He can see right away that they are comics. They have been meticulously inked, with straight, precise margins (of which Ishimaru approves) and detailed art. There are four stacks, each held together by a paperclip, and he picks one up and takes a look at the first page. Immediately he sees it for what it is, and his stomach turns to ice. From nearly every panel, Maizono smiles up at him. In several cases she is surrounded by sparkles and roses, hair cascading in the wind. It’s a good likeness, he has to admit; her eyes, her mouth and her delicate hands have been faithfully reproduced. When he puts the comic down and picks up the next one, his hands are already shaking. It’s Kuwata this time; athletic and handsome in baseball gear, sweating from practice. He quickly exchanges it for the next. Fujisaki, of course. His eyes are big, with long eyelashes, and he sits typing away at a computer dressed in his usual school uniform. Ishimaru almost can’t bring himself to look at the next one, but he has to, so he does. He is crying before he even sees his face.
It takes an hour to gather everyone. He situates himself at the short end of a table in the cafeteria, where Kirigiri and Naegi are talking. Voice quavering, he tells them to get the others, and refuses to elaborate when they ask him what’s wrong. He has brought the comics – all four of them – and busies himself with laying them out, face down, perfectly parallel to the edge of the table. In the hour that passes he adjusts and readjusts them, the tiniest fraction-of-a-millimeter change each time, and tries not to think about what’s on them. He hasn’t been able to bring himself to read them. Some of his classmates, filing into the room one at a time, try to ask him what’s going on; Asahina sits down two seats from him, and every time he glances up at her she is looking at him with concern in her eyes. Most of them simply take their seats at the table, muttering and grumbling amongst themselves. He flinches imperceptibly when, out of the corner of his eye, he sees Yamada enter the room. The last one to arrive is Hagakure, and then Ishimaru stands.
He clears his throat and squares his shoulders, keeping his eyes on the table. The others quiet down.
“We have a situation,” he says. “Something terrible has happened.” Asahina gasps.
“Not another murder?!”
“Of course not,” says Togami, glaring at her. “We’re all here, aren’t we?”
“Oh,” she says. “That’s true.” Still, she shoots him a glare. “What’s going on, then?”
“Due to the recent… incidents,” Ishimaru continues, “I have been conducting searches of your rooms.”
There is a collective cry of outrage; Kirigiri’s eyes narrow, and Asahina looks terribly violated. Yamada looks as shocked as the others, but doesn’t seem to have understood what’s happening. Ishimaru swallows.
“It was for the good of the group, I assure you! Would you rather have more…” He can’t say it. He can’t. “The alternative is worse. Anyway, that’s not the point! I… found something in one of the rooms.”
“Spit it out, idiot!” Syo hollers, brandishing her scissors. Ishimaru picks up one of the comics and looks at it for a moment; it’s the one with Mondo. He is on the back of his motorcycle, coat billowing in the wind. Ishimaru screws his eyes shut for a moment to avoid crying, then slides the comic across the table. As everyone takes in the sight before them, he flips the rest of the comics over and waits.
Yamada’s eyes widen at the sight. Naegi picks up the Maizono comic with trembling hands; beside him, Kirigiri’s lips grow thin. Asahina clamps a hand over her mouth. Even Togami looks faintly outraged.
“Yamada,” says Kirigiri; she’s as calm as ever, but there’s a dangerous edge to her voice. “These are yours, I take it?”
“Yes,” squeaks Yamada, “but—“
“How dare you?” Asahina spits, eyes glistening with tears. “They were our friends!”
“To sully their memory in this way….” Oogami shakes her head grimly.
“Hang on a second!” says Yamada. “I haven’t sullied anything!”
“Give us a break, fatso!” says Syo, laughing. “It’s porn, isn’t it?” She pauses, then reaches for the Fujisaki one; Ishimaru snatches it back.
“I’m glad you all see the gravity of this,” he manages. “Yamada, this behaviour is unacceptable! These aren’t characters you can do whatever you want with!” He knows his eyes are already brimming with tears, but he goes on. “This is despicable!”
“No, wait!” says Yamada, desperation clear in his voice. “You don’t understand!”
“We understand perfectly,” says Kirigiri coolly. “You don’t have anything to busy yourself with, so you thought you’d use the death of your classmates to give you something to write about. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what kind of filth this is.”
Naegi, still staring at the front page of the Maizono comic, swallows audibly. “They were people, Yamada.”
Yamada stands up, walks over to Ishimaru and takes the Mondo comic. Ishimaru tries to protest – you have no right, you have no right to touch him – but Yamada furiously flips several pages into the comic and thrusts it back into his hands. Ishimaru reluctantly looks down, and his breath catches in his throat.
In the comic, Mondo is laughing. He is doubled over, hands on his stomach, as one of his gang members tells him a joke. It appears to be night, and he is surrounded by bikers, looking at him with respect and affection. Ishimaru flips a page, then another; Mondo smiling, Mondo riding his bike, Mondo heroically besting someone in a fistfight. He doesn’t realise he’s crying until a tear rolls off his cheek and onto the paper, a tiny wet smudge of ink over Mondo’s leg. He sits back down and replaces the comic on the table, then fists his hands in the fabric of his trousers and shuts his eyes as his body convulses in violent sobs. The room is silent.
“I’m sorry, Yamada,” he chokes out. “This is…”
“What is in that comic?” Celes asks; it’s the first thing she’s said since the start of the meeting. Ishimaru hears murmurs and the rustle of paper; he manages to open his eyes, and through the haze of tears he sees his remaining classmates take in the comics. His vision is too blurred for him to make out who’s reading what. He wipes his eyes on the sleeve of his uniform and pushes the sobs back into his throat. Naegi is reading Maizono’s comic; Ishimaru catches glimpses of her performing before adoring crowds. Asahina is flipping through the one about Fujisaki. The angle prevents him from seeing what’s in the comic, but her eyes are wet with tears. Hagakure is caught up in Kuwata’s story; he’s not crying, but he reads in stunned silence. Yamada is still standing a few paces away, and when Ishimaru looks up at him he smiles hesitantly before averting his eyes.
“This isn’t what I expected,” Kirigiri murmurs, summing up all of their feelings. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s alright,” says Yamada. “I would’ve thought the same thing if I were you.”
“Why?” Asahina breathes. Her voice is unsteady. “Why did you make these? I don’t understand.”
“These are… their dreams, right?” says Naegi. “The life they wanted.” He smiles shakily at Yamada, who nods.
“It’s what they wanted to do once they left school,” he mumbles. “They won’t get to leave school, so it seemed fair.”
“An admirable gesture,” says Oogami. “We were too hasty in our judgment, it seems.”
Ishimaru gets to his feet, turns to Yamada and hugs him. He seems uncertain how to respond – vaguely Ishimaru thinks that he probably isn’t shown very much physical affection – but he gives Ishimaru a tentative pat on the back. When he lets go he is smiling.
“Thank you,” he says, and he means it. “They’re beautiful.”
He gets a chance to read the full comics later on, once everyone’s calmed down. In Mondo’s comic, he returns to his gang and earns their respect, and one by one the bikers tell him he’s made his brother proud. Maizono becomes the most famous singer in the world and spends her days touring with the other band members, eating pizza and laughing and performing sold-out concerts. Fujisaki learns to stand up for himself; he becomes strong, just like he wanted, while at the same time perfecting Alter Ego. Kuwata wins plenty of baseball games, but decides it isn’t for him and goes on to become a celebrated rock star. The one thing they have in common is the blissful smiles they all wear towards the end of the comics. Ishimaru returns them to Yamada in mint condition, and thinks that maybe he understands him a bit better.